The tutor points out an elegant feature of spreadsheets.

Formulas in Excel default to relative referencing. Consider the following illustration:

Let’s imagine you input 101 in cell e10. Then, in f11, you input the formula =e10. Of course, when you press Enter, f11 will show the value 101 from e10.

Now, suppose you go to g2 and type in the value 105. Then, you return to f11, right-click, and select Copy. Next, you go to h3, right click, then select Paste. Likely, you’ll see 105 (not 101) appear in h3. The reason is that the formula =e10, placed in f11, has a relative meaning:

=the value in the cell left one, and up one, from this one

Therefore, when that formula is copied to h3, it gives the value from g2.

Relative referencing has powerful consequences. I’ll be talking more about it in future posts:)

Jack of Oracle Tutoring by Jack and Diane, Campbell River, BC.